Madeline described working late into the evening sanding a dining table, arguing with Rose about paint colors, and laughing with Patricia when a customer ordered six identical chairs with six different measurements.

She wrote that ordinary people could make loving choices and selfish choices in the same lifetime.

She warned against deciding that an entire person was either a saint or a villain based on one moment.

But beneath that, in her familiar steady handwriting, came a sentence I needed especially badly: *Understanding why someone hurts you does not require you to stay where you are being hurt.*

I sat with the letter for a long time.